October 6 2005 21:30 Wall Street surrendered earlier gains to close lower on Thursday, after comments on inflation from a Federal Reserve official overshadowed a continued decline in oil prices and major retailers calming fears over a sharp slowdown in US consumer spending.

October 7 2005 03:00 One in four company directors in London and the south–east has changed his or her travel arrangements to work since the terrorist attacks in July, the capital‘s biggest business membership body has revealed.

October 7 2005 03:00 The government has delayed rules setting out how well pension schemes should be funded – generating "sheer frustration" among employers, according to one leading firm of pension consultants.

The new requirements are to replace the "minimum funding requirement" an >>>

October 7 2005 03:00 Liberty, the human rights organisation, is seeking to intervene in the legal challenge being mounted over the Serious Fraud Office‘s decision not to investigate and prosecute three former investment bankers wanted on Enron–related fraud charges in the US, in the UK.

October 7 2005 03:00 A deal that will cost NHS Trusts contracting out cleaning, catering, laundry and similar services Â£75m a year has been struck in a move hailed by unions as "the beginning of the end of two–tier workforces" in the health service.

October 7 2005 03:00 Granta, the independent publisher of the largest selling literary quarterly in the English language, has been sold by its American owner Rea Hederman, who also owns the New York Review of Books and its book imprints.

Mr Hederman has been associated with Granta since 1'87 when it was t >>>

October 7 2005 03:00 The highly–charged feud between Charles Saatchi and the owners of London‘s County Hall, where his art collection is housed, moved into the High Court yesterday, with the businessman being accused of "outrageous intimidatory tactics" and with demands for his gallery to be evic >>>

October 7 2005 00:03 General Electric has agreed to start dredging parts of the Hudson River in upstate New York – 30 years after the polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) chemicals it discharged there were banned as an environmental pollutant.

The US conglomerate reached a deal with the Environmental Protecti >>>

October 6 2005 1':26 The Bush administration on Thursday faced renewed calls for an independent inspection of its GuantÃ¡namo Bay detention facility following allegations that the US military was force feeding 20 detainees on hunger strike.

October 7 2005 00:14 Karl Rove has agreed to make a late–stage appearance before a grand jury investigating whether White House officials broke the law by exposing a covert CIA operative, underscoring the increasingly central role of the president‘s top political adviser in the inquiry.

October 6 2005 20:27 Lawmakers on the Senate banking committee on Thursday expressed deep reservations about the way the US vets foreign takeovers of companies, highlighting a subtle power struggle that has emerged over the issue between the Congress and the White House.

October 6 2005 21:05 The US move came after EADS, the 80 per cent owner of the European aircraft maker, gave the go–ahead for Airbus to build its planned A350 long–range aircraft to compete with the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. But EADS said it would postpone drawing down any state aid in an effort to restart ne >>>

October 6 2005 18:43 Capping a week of frantic diplomatic progress between the European Union and the republics of the former Yugoslavia, a surprise vote by legislators in Bosnia‘s Serb–dominated sub–state, RepublikaSrpska, has removed the last obstacle to association negotiations between Bosnia and >>>

October 6 2005 1':15 Not so long ago, London appeared to enjoy an almost cordial relationship with Iran. Tony Blair, prime minister, regularly despatched Jack Straw, his foreign secretary, to cultivate ties with the Islamic republic in the run–up to the Iraq war and again, afterwards, when Britain played a le >>>

October 6 2005 23:27 President George W. Bush on Thursday issued his strongest warning yet on the threat from Islamic extremism, saying that America‘s enemies "have endless ambitions of imperial domination".

At the same time he rejected critics who charge that the US is losing ground in that s >>>

October 6 2005 12:43 Weak industrial production figures on Thursday increased the prospect of a further cut in British interest rates, while the European Central Bank signalled a possible move in the opposite direction as it strengthened its anti–inflationary rhetoric.

October 4 2005 20:43 The private sector makes up about 40 of the 1,600 Chinese companies listed on the domestic and overseas bourses and their combined market capitalisation is less than 3 per cent of the total. In the banking market, less than 10 per cent of credit goes to private enterprises. Official data shows the >>>

October 6 2005 20:21 A shortage of well–trained graduates could hinder the growth of the Chinese economy and prevent it from developing more sophisticated industries, according to a report by consultants McKinsey.

A lack of practical skills and poor English–speaking levels will make it hard for Ch >>>

October 6 2005 14:26 Vietnam‘s Communist authorities have given the go–ahead for the country‘s first dollar–denominated sovereign bond, ending nearly 10 years of internal debate over the wisdom of plunging into the international capital markets.

October 6 2005 18:30 The US and Britain on Thursday issued blunt warnings to Iran and Syria over their alleged involvement with terrorist groups, with Tony Blair declaring there was no justification for Tehran interfering in Iraq‘s affairs.

October 6 2005 17:52 The Israeli Supreme Court on Thursday outlawed the army‘s use of Palestinian civilians as human shields during round–ups of suspects in the occupied territories, ruling the practice contrary to international law.

October 6 2005 1':54 I am told that I was not alone in pondering such a resolution as the ministerial bargaining ran late into Sunday night. If the Vienna government feared cultural contamination from Turkish entry, one senior negotiator mused, it should join Switzerland in splendid isolation on Europe‘s mar >>>

October 6 2005 23:03 The Federal Bureau of Investigation told New York City officials about a specific threat to the city‘s subway system, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said on Thursday. This was the first time there has been "a threat with this level of specificity" to the city‘s transportation system >>>

October 6 2005 1':54 For 40 years, the Soviet bloc had three television channels that were programmed entirely by the government. They had control of how the west was portrayed behind the "iron curtain". The cold war was prosecuted, at least to some extent, through the control of information and the care >>>

October 7 2005 03:56 Christopher Hill, chief US negotiator on the North Korea nuclear issue, on Thursday signalled his willingness to travel to the communist state as long as a visit would not jeopardise US interests.

Following months of negotiations in the six–party talks, Mr Hill last month succeeded >>>

October 7 2005 00:05 A Czech financier and an employee of US insurance company AIG have been indicted by US authorities for allegedly taking part in an illegal scheme to bribe top Azerbaijan officials to buy its state oil company on the cheap.

October 6 2005 22:55 The US administration on Thursday said the country needed to "think beyond the boundaries of current farm policy" in a sign that it was prepared to reconsider decades of reliance on direct agricultural subsidies for its farmers.

Peter Jones A new exhibition of ancient Persian material at the British Museum has brought out the usual affirmations about how wonderfully humane and civilised Persians were, and how vicious the Greeks were in painting a picture of them as slavish, effeminate subjects of an oriental despotism that has helped pervert W >>>

Increasingly it is historians who have the answers in science Paul Johnson The bipolarity of science and the humanities has always been a false and inhibiting distinction. Now the enmity between what C.P. Snow called ‘the Two Cultures’ is coming to an end. It has lasted 200 years. Before that, knowledge was seen as a w >>>

Tom Walker It was just as the Crazy Frog had finished belting out across the Tannoy into the gloaming of the Black Sea that it happened: out came the giant flag of Georgi Iliev, surrounded by thousands of smaller Iliev posters, held up by the Lokomotiv Plovdiv faithful. ‘We will never forget, we will always follow your >>>

A soling and heeling for Boots, or just another round of hunt the thimble? Christopher Fildes Boots, Boots, Boots, Boots, moving up and down again — no discharge in the war .... Just another change of strategy and an alliance with Alliance.

Michael Heseltine A decade ago, as president of the Board of Trade, I was responsible for competition policy. I could refer or not refer. I could accept advice or reject it. In the background — but not far away — were Parliament and public scrutiny. How times change. The Office of Fair Trading is now its own creature.< >>>

Ross Clark I don’t know whether Maria Otone de Menezes, the mother of Jean Charles de Menezes, the Brazilian electrician shot by police at Stockwell underground station on 22 July, has hired the services of a PR firm, but even Max Clifford could not have timed better her arrival in Britain. As Mrs Menezes and other mem >>>

Mark Steyn New HampshireFrom President Bush’s press conference on Tuesday: Question: ‘Are you still a conservative?’ The President: ‘Am I what?’Any port in a storm, especially after the storm has passed. I said in the Telegraph the other day that the minute Hurricane Katrina hit, the media started scampering around lik >>>

Spanish style Taki Madrid This is the sultriest city in Europe and, along with Paris and Rome, the most romantic capital of the old continent. When visiting Madrid there is only one place to stay, the Hotel Ritz, right in the heart of the city, opposite the Prado. There is a bucolic air about the Ritz, with the wide le >>>

Terror in Mogadishu Aidan Hartley On a recent drive in downtown Mogadishu with ten heavily armed bodyguards, I passed the site of the old US embassy, and observed a melancholy scene that Britain and the USA might ponder if they decide to bale out of Iraq early. The embassy has been totally demolished, either out of hat >>>

Waiting for Mr Kurtz Jeremy Clarke The yellow plastic tables on the terrace outside the ferry–terminal bar faced directly into the afternoon sun. It was the last week of September and surprisingly hot. We’d been over to Roscoff for the day, from Plymouth, just for something to do, and we’d been uncomfortably hot >>>

Dot Wordsworth Mr Trevor Phillips, who runs the Commission for Racial Equality, said recently that there were ghettos developing in Britain that were ‘literal black holes into which nobody goes without fear and trepidation and nobody escapes undamaged’. I am not sure why they are literally black holes. The point about >>>

David Davis has suddenly acquired the air of the runner–up Peter Oborne Despite well–meaning efforts by Francis Maude, Theresa May and Alan Duncan to cast a pall over the occasion, Blackpool 2005 turned out to be the most life–enhancing Tory party conference in recent years. With 6,000 members present >>>

Mr David Davis, Mr Kenneth Clarke, Mr David Cameron, Dr Liam Fox and Sir Malcolm Rifkind displayed what attractions they could muster as candidates for the leadership of the Conservative party at its annual conference in Blackpool. Boots the chemist, with 1,400 outlets in Britain, announced a merger with Allied UniChem >>>

At last the Tories have found their Clause Four: it’s Simon Heffer Frank Johnson I have thought, and might have written, that one of David Cameron’s drawbacks as a politician, as opposed to as a man, is a reluctance to make enemies or even opponents. In this he resembles many young politicians of today.

Sven’s last stand Frank Keating A revitalised Scottish team will cause a heck of a bonny din at splintery auld Hampden this afternoon — olde tyme optimism. Ditto Northern Ireland at venerable Windsor Park. Neither are likely to qualify for next year’s World Cup finals, but England are, yet the preliminaries to their ma >>>

Cameron’s task Many Conservatives will have left the party’s Blackpool conference with their feelings about the leadership contest transformed. As the horses enter the final stretch, the pulses of the punters are unquestionably quickening, and the smart money must surely be moving on to David Cameron. It is no disrespe >>>

Bruce Anderson On Monday morning, a tense young politician was rehearsing a speech. The performance was less than fluent; the delivery was far too fast. The youngster’s peace of mind did not benefit from his growing awareness that he was being overheard. A number of journalists had managed to slip into the hall.>>>

Charles Moore Blackpool ‘With his designer wife, his two children (there is a third on the way) and his Notting Hill home, Mr Cameron does not look like a traditional Tory,’ I read in the papers. In what sense is this not a traditional Tory set of attributes? True, most Tories do not have designer wives — either in the >>>

Charlotte Leslie For me, there was no debate as to whether I should go to university. I had to go to university, and for all the right reasons: I had fallen in love and I was prepared to embrace debt and disgrace for the object of my desire.

Rachel Johnson Listen to this furry tail. Dee, a basset hound bitch, needed a hysterectomy (fully paid for by private medical insurance). Before the operation, Dee’s owner, Sarah Toynbee, asked the surgeon whether she would tidy up a flabby portion of Dee’s midsection while she was at it. She phrased her request in muc >>>

Q. I am the only child of parents in their seventies who are not super–rich but who do own a house in Dorset worth more than the £265,000 one is allowed to inherit before the 40 per cent inheritance tax comes into play. Ideally they would hand ownership of the house over to me no >>>